If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you before any questioning if you wish.
The Miranda rights are very clear and they are for the purpose of protecting a client or defendant from making self-incriminating statements to law enforcement because he or she is not aware of the law or how it works (Marcus, 1990).
High courts have ruled that inmates have the right to have counsel present during questioning just like non-incarcerated people have the right to do.
In a Maryland case in which an inmate was accused of murdering another inmate on a prison bus his attorney instructed authorities not to question him with the attorney present (Klein, 2005).
That request was upheld by court even though conversations that took place on the bus before the attorney was apprised of the new situation could have been very damaging to the suspect.
In a Colorado Supreme Court case, Adkins vs. Colorado he was read his rights and asked why he didn't have an attorney yet, and was told he would probably get one in the morning. He was then questioned before that time. The court ruled he had the right to have an attorney present therefore anything he said during the questioning had to be left out of evidence at his trial (Abbott, 2005).
APPLY
In this case of Bob trying to kill Carl with a bomb attached to his car the police officer went to visit Bob after Bob was incarcerated, charged and had already been indicted. This means that Bob had...
The fact that Art did not identify himself as a law enforcement officer during the visit to Bob makes it even more suspicious. During those visits Bob made several self damaging statements and those statements should be ruled as not able to be used foe evidence during Bob's trial.
CONCLUSION
The fact that the undercover agent did not identify himself as such during the set up process was not illegal. The fact that he helped make the bomb but made sure it would not detonate is not illegal. These were things done during the investigation before the crime was committed, however, once Bob was arrested, charged, and indicted Art had no legal right to visit Bob in jail without identifying himself as a police officer, and then try to use the self damaging statement admissions made by Bob during those visits during Bob's trial. On appeal a high court would most likely find that the self damaging statements could not be introduced as evidence.
References
Klein, Allison (2005) lLawyer Prohibits Inmate's Questioning; Convict, Victim Were on Md. Prison Bus the Washington Post
Marcus, Ruth (1990) High Court Limits Police in Questioning Suspects; Miranda Rule on Lawyer's Presence Widened the Washington Post
Richard, Leo (2001) Questioning the relevance of Miranda in the twenty-first century.
Michigan Law Review
